Silence in the consumer experience: A conceptualization and research agenda

How Should We Interpret Silence in Qualitative Communication Studies?

“…Ultimately, encultured silences can signal that one social group is powerful enough to silence or colonize the silence of others. Dehlig (2023), in a conceptual paper on silence from the perspective of the consumer experience, represents the objective and subjective sources of the silence experience, and notes that silence can stem from an inner quiet state of mind; it can signal the absence of voice in a relational context, and be objectively identified (in the length of verbal pauses, in the absence of verbal interaction, in the absence of an interlocutor, as a signal of sociocultural conventions) or subjectively assessed (in the avoidance of topics, by using discretion in the conversation, by omitting or by signalling ignorance on a topic). Dehkharghani et al (2023), in a review assessing silence in an organizational context, look at 92 studies from the last two decades to identify a gap in the production of qualitative studies.…”

Malls designed for inclusion? Emotional experience of irritating aspects of the mallscape that distance consumers with disabilities

“…The few relevant studies of the retail environment include Baker et al (2007), who investigated elements in the retail environment that communicate a message of inclusion or exclusion to shoppers with disability, and others focused on specific disabilities (e.g. hearing-impaired shoppers; Dehling, 2023; Beudaert et al , 2017). In this study, we build on this work and respond to Edwards et al ’s (2018) call for research by examining the emotional reactions of shoppers with various disabilities to a range of environmental irritants and the impact of these reactions on the actual avoidance of mall visits.…”

“…Our work makes several contributions. First, our study is the first to offer a systematic, comprehensive analysis of the impact of a wide range of environmental irritants on shoppers with disability, extending the current very limited work (Beudaert et al , 2017; Dehling, 2023; Baker et al , 2007). Second, this study extends the small stream of research on irritating aspects of retail environments in individual stores (Aylott and Mitchell, 1998; D’Astous, 2000; Demoulin and Willems, 2019; Baker et al , 2007) to the context of mall environments.…”

“…Third, we improve methodologically on prior work by using mall-visit frequency to measure actual avoidance behavior [analogous to Jung et al (2021) in the context of approach behaviors], rather than measuring hypothetical behavioral intentions as a reaction to feelings of irritation and to retail environmental irritants. Finally, we deepen the analysis of environmental irritants and shoppers with disability (Beudaert et al , 2017; Dehling, 2023; Baker et al , 2007) by using large qualitative and quantitative samples and comparing shoppers with and without disability. This allowed us to determine how irritants affect shoppers with disability differently than shoppers without disability and include a wider range of factors to present more tangible recommendations for mall owners to consider when creating more inclusive retail spaces.…”